Conventionally, in the production of semiconductor devices, fine processing by lithography using a photoresist has been performed. The fine processing is a processing method for forming fine convexo-concave shapes corresponding to the pattern on the surface of a substrate by: forming a thin film of a photoresist on a semiconductor substrate such as a silicon wafer; irradiating the resultant thin film with active rays such as ultraviolet rays through a mask pattern in which a pattern transferred to a semiconductor device is depicted; performing development; and subjecting the substrate to etching processing using the resultant photoresist film in which the obtained pattern is formed as a protecting film. Recently, however, semiconductor devices with higher densities have increased and the adopted active rays tend to have a shorter wavelength, such as KrF excimer laser (248 nm) and further ArF excimer laser (193 nm), replacing ultraviolet rays. Following such a tendency, the influence of reflection of active rays on a semiconductor substrate has become a large problem.
In addition, as an underlayer film between the semiconductor substrate and the photoresist, the use of a film known as a hardmask containing a metal element such as silicon and titanium (see, for example Patent Document 1) is performed. In this case, the resist and the hardmask have components largely different from each other, so that the removal rates of the resist and the hardmask by dry etching largely depend on the type of a gas used for dry etching. By appropriately selecting the type of a gas, the hardmask can be removed by dry etching without a large decrease in the film thickness of the photoresist.
Thus, in the production of semiconductor devices in recent years, for achieving various effects such as the reflection preventing effect, a resist underlayer film is disposed between the semiconductor substrate and the photoresist. The studies of a composition for a resist underlayer film have been also performed until today, however, due to the diversity of characteristics required for the composition and so on, the development of a novel material for the resist underlayer film is desired.
In addition, there is disclosed the application of a film formed from a polysiloxane material containing cyanuric acid to a lithography process (see Patent Document 2).